As expected, upscale Connecticut liberals eked out a narrow win over their more moderate blue collar co-religionists to nominate another Northeastern blue-blood to represent the "party of the little guy..."

The spin has started big time (including mine?). The reality is that this is not a good day for Democrats and I think they know it. It is not as they say, a message about the Iraq war--everybody knows that the chi-chi liberals of the Northeast were and are against the war--who cares? The Ned Lamonts of the world "don't do" military service under any circumstances. Its a temper tantrum--and nothing made that clearer than the respective statements of Joe Lieberman and Ned Lamont.

Lamont said nothing memorable, but Lieberman made an unassailable point--he was punished for doing essentially what a politician should do--keeping the lines of communication open with the opposing party in order to find a way to get the work of the Senate done. What's Lamont going to do--stamp his feet until he gets his way?

Publicly, other Democrat office-holders are going to pledge their support to the nominee of the party, but privately I think there will be considerable subrosa support for Lieberman. Life just got much more difficult for Democrat politicians hoping to "centrist" their way to the presidency.

On the other hand--Cynthia McKinney went down for the count, which is objectively a good thing for the Democrats. An embarrassment removed. Now on to Maxine Waters, Sheila Jackson Lee and the rest of the kook conga line. Given a generation or two, the Democrat party could look like a collection of thoughtful individuals...

Don't tell Greg, but Rick Santorum is closing on Bob Casey Jr.

A number of polls, while varying in the spread, all show Santorum gaining ground on Casey, with one poll--the Morning Call/Muhlenberg poll, with Santorum six points of Casey. Santorum has been steadily gaining ground throughout the spring and summer, demonstrating the right kind of momentum for a November peaking.

While the conventional wisdom has been that Santorum is toast, even his harshest critics are contemplating the possibility that he will be competitive at election time.

I looked at the blog this morning and saw an advertisement from Wesley Clark's PAC--Wespac, asking supporters to email Joe Lieberman and ask him to drop out of the race so that Ned Lamont can basically run unopposed (I sincerely doubt Republicans could support the Republican nominee without holding their noses...).

Feeling a little mischievous this morning, I edited the subject line and letter and sent it along to the Lieberman campaign.

I regret my childish prank, and urge you not to follow my bad example. However, you might be interested in my editing of the subject line and content (please do not copy and paste the following--that would be wrong...). The original is located here...for comparison purposes only you understand.

Subject: Please kick Ned Lamont's Ass

On Tuesday, the message sent by navel-gazing liberal Connecticut primary voters was loud and clear. They want change, and they want Ned Lamont to represent them in the U.S. Senate.

In 2000, the moonbat liberal support of a third party candidate, Ralph Nader, no doubt played a role in the defeat of you and Vice President Gore in your run for the White House. Now the moonbats are attempting to deny Connecticut voters a voice in the vital affairs of the nation--and ironically, they call themselves "Democrats".

As a democrat, I believe in one man, one vote and believe the Democratic nominee for the US Senate in Connecticut should have to compete in an election where there is a real choice, and I ask you to do likewise. Because too much is at stake with our troubles abroad and at home, we cannot play games this Election Day.

I strongly urge you to continue your bid for the Senate as an Independent and defeat Ned Lamont, the barely-nominated Democrat.

Let the real voters of Connecticut decide who will represent them in the Senate.

My representative to the House may be in for a rough ride this election.

Jim Matheson, Democrat in the deep red state of Utah may be in trouble.

Not because he's a Democrat, but because he isn't Democrat enough.

Matheson addressed the American Legion in the company of Rice, Rumsfeld and Bush this past week, angering the lunatic wing of the party de facto led by Salt Lake City mayor narcissist Rocky Anderson.

Among more liberal Democrats, there have been rumblings about whether Jim Matheson is a "true Democrat" for quite a while. Recently, Mayor Rocky Anderson turned up the heat up on the congressman, saying Matheson has strayed from the party ideals and he's even suggesting something drastic.

Rocky Anderson, Salt Lake City Mayor: "Maybe we should support the Green party candidate and send the message that when we elect a democrat, we expect them to be a democrat."

The significance of that kind of action lies in the makeup of Utah's second district, it was essentially fixed to be heavily Republican. Matheson survives as a Democrat by walking a tightrope, working hard to maintain a moderate profile to win Republicans over, but he also needs a base of Democrats in Salt Lake County.

Matheson voted for the war and has not engaged in any of the tap-dancing that has characterized some of the more spineless members of his party. Ordinarily one would expect that this would help him in his heavily Republican district, but as a lot of Democrats are learning these days, the Republicans aren't the problem.

Matheson was first elected in 1998 largely because of the disarray in the Republican party caused by the primary defeat of Merrill Kook Cook by an inexperienced political novice. Matheson had the talent and the money and narrowly won the seat. He survived redistricting in 2004 thank to another weak Republican candidate and a fine sense of political balance.

This year his luck may run out.

According to a number of the state's political scientists, Matheson needs to carry 60% of South Salt Lake's Democrat vote to win reelection. A significant move to the Green party candidate could doom him to private law practice.

This isn't a pure ideological play either.

Consider the following events:

1. Rocky Anderson announced he won't run for relection as mayor of Salt Lake City.

2. Anderson engages in race-baiting, religious bigotry and character assassination at a rally to protest the Bush visit to Salt Lake City. The left loves it. Anderson gets broad national media coverage. Everyone loves an A-hole.

3. Anderson calls on Utah Democrats to support the Green party candidate over DINO Matheson.

Political donations are scarce in Utah, and what does exists goes to Republican candidates by and large. Democrats are forced to look to out-of-state money to mount credible challenges or self-finance. Anderson has just established his moonbat bonafides with his anti-Bush rally, thus guaranteeing him a hearing with the party's financiers.

If Matheson wins this year, there is no place politically for Anderson to go. He would have to mount a primary challenge against Matheson which would be a long shot. Utah's Democrats are concentrated in Salt Lake City, but most are not of the insane variety. Moonbat support would not be enough to dump Matheson and centrists would be unlikely to abandon a four term congressman.

If Matheson loses its a different ball game. Anderson is the highest profile Democrat in the state and with two years to moderate his tone, he could easily win the nomination. Could he win in a general election?

Its impossible to know of course, but where Matheson is well-liked by everybody, including Republicans, Andersen is an extremely polarizing figure in Utah. Matheson gets a big Republican vote that Andersen wouldn't get in a million years.

Regardless of Rocky's ultimate prospects for success, its clear he's making all the right moves to set up a shot at the brass ring.

I enjoyed Mick's comments on the assualt on Democratic Congressman Jim Matheson by the mayor of Salt Lake, Rocky Anderson, Utah’s senior member of the Moonbat Caucus.

It’s interesting, but Matheson will survive easily.

What’s more interesting is how many on the right are eager to focus on races like Matheson, or like Lieberman/Lamont in Connecticut, yet neglect to report on the efforts of wingnuts in their own party to purge the centerists.

Look at Rhode Island….

Crossposted

Well actually, I can only confirm that Lincoln Chafee won his primary, although Cardin has such a commanding lead at this point that I'm calling it for him.

Chafee got a lot of support from the Bush Whitehouse who figure a left-of-center Republican is better than no Republican at all. I tend to agree. Rhode Island is what it is--a blue state. For those wishing for a more Republican Republican Senator--its the electorate stupid.

Ben Cardin will now face Michael Steele in the general. Democrats are worried

A Maryland Democratic strategist who didn't want to be quoted by name fretting about his party's chances was more blunt: "No one really knows how a black Republican will really play."

He added: "There is meta-anxiety about losing the black vote."

Steele's strikingly different advertising campaign has highlighted that concern. One of Steele's commercials features only African Americans praising him, with one voter saying she is going to "cross party lines" to support him. "He's selling his personality, which frankly is appealing," said the Democratic strategist. "His message is: 'I'm a nice guy, I understand you're frustrated with Washington.' "

Steele has carefully played up endorsements from unorthodox supporters such as hip-hop impresario Russell Simmons and played down support from Bush, Vice President Cheney and other national Republican leaders who have helped provide money to air his ads. "Do I look like George Bush?" he asks, when Democrats charge that he is too much like the president..

Two predicted losers are now within four points of their opponents. Mike Dewine in Ohio and Rick Santorum in Pennsylvania are closing substantial gaps just in time to make them good bets to win in November. Tom Kean Jr. has closed a six point gap to bring himself even with Bob Menendez in New Jersey.

Mixed feelings about the news in Connecticut. Joe Lieberman's lead over Lamont has closed from ten points to four. I don't have a dog in that race, but I respect Lieberman, and Lamont?--not so much.

All of a sudden the Democrats have gotten vewee, vewee quiet...

Senator George Allen, the quintessential southern Evangelical Protestant good ol' boy is technically a Jew.

Now, just when you thought Virginia's U.S. Senate race couldn't get any weirder, the Jews of Tunis are making a cameo.

At a debate in Tysons Corner yesterday between Republican Allen and Democrat Webb, WUSA-TV's Peggy Fox asked Allen, the tobacco-chewing, cowboy-boot-wearing son of a pro football coach, if his Tunisian-born mother has Jewish blood.

"It has been reported," said Fox, that "your grandfather Felix, whom you were given your middle name for, was Jewish. Could you please tell us whether your forebears include Jews and, if so, at which point Jewish identity might have ended?"

Allen was shocked and appalled that someone would out his Jewishness, but his reaction begs the question of why Allen has obfuscated his heritage, claiming, "my mother is French-Italian with a little bit of Spanish blood in her, and I've been raised, and she was, as far as I know, raised as a Christian."

If it was just Allen, this would simply be a interesting but minor event, but John Kerry also failed to mention his Jewish heritage, encouraging voters to believe he was Irish, in fact lying about it, not once but twice on the record.

In a draft of prepared remarks reported in the Boston Globe, Kerry told a group in 1984: "As some of you may know, I am part-English and part-Irish. And when my Kerry ancestors first came over to Massachusetts from the old country to find work in the New World, it was my English ancestors who refused to hire them."

Then in 1986 on the floor of the Senate, John Kerry said, "For those of us who are fortunate to share an Irish ancestry, we take great pride in the contributions that Irish-Americans ..."

It's interesting that each of these events occurred relatively early in Kerry's career, at a time when ethnic voting patterns would be the most important to a candidate. It's also interesting that, in classic Kerry fashion, the senator claims they never happened.

His spokesperson says the quote from the Senate floor was in a written statement submitted for the record by a Kerry staffer but never read by Kerry. Kerry's staff also claims that Kerry rejected the "Luck O' the Irish" speech in 1984 as well. Gee, what a coincidence.

It also seems an odd coincidence that at least two of Kerry's staffers thought he was Irish, probably a good indicator of just how hard the senator was working to set the record straight. And not a single attendee of the traditional Southie's St. Patrick's Day political breakfast has yet to mention the year Kerry announced he was not part of the Celtic clan.

Madeline Albright also apparently "didn't know" she was Jewish.

Is this a commentary on latent American bigotry or cynical ethnic politics? Hard to say. In 2000, Al Gore thought Joe Lieberman's unabashed Jewishness was an asset.

I have to wonder whether there wasn't a little Machivellian politics involved. I always considered George Allen to have the inside track for the presidential nomination as a southern Evangelical. Mitt Romney has a lot going for him as well except for that "Mormon thing". Now George Allen has to deal with the suspicion that he may be a crypto-Jew, an insincere convert to Christianity.

I don't actually know if there is such a thing anymore, but it doesn't matter--the suspicion is damaging enough among the constituents that Allen is courting.

Perhaps I'm just too suspicious, but there seems something Machivellian about the whole episode, particularly when I saw this:

Fox (WUSA-TV's Peggy Fox) took a long drink from her water bottle. In the second round of questions, she chose the relative safety of Iraq, saying, "I don't think this question will get me booed."

"I was shocked," she said after the event. Disclosing that her great-grandfather was a Mormon polygamist, she added: "Why would he get so angry at the suggestion there might be something in your background that's Jewish? I don't think that's a bad thing at all."

Fox said her motive was curiosity. "I thought it was important to find out is this part of his heritage, because if it is nobody knows it. Do you deny part of your heritage for political reasons?"

Perhaps Peggy, descendent of Mormon polygamists, just thought it was unfair that fellow descendent of Mormon polygamists, Mitt Romney, was catching political flack for who is grandparents were, and thought Allen should get a little taste of the same medicine.

I'm just saying...

George Allen is claiming that he only found out that his mother was a Jew last month.

I suppose its possible, just not very likely. Most people have a healthy curiosity about their family's heritage. One of the largest tourist attractions in Utah is the LDS Genealogical Library in downtown Salt Lake City. I had numerous friends who felt compelled to seek out their birth parents in spite of warnings that they might not be British royalty. The drive to know where you come from is pretty strong.

I've pestered my parents since before I was ten years old to know something about her family. My father was from Austria and my mother from Germany, so you can bet that I asked some pretty pointed questions about what everybody was doing between 1939 and 1945. I pretty much had all the family secrets in my possession by the time I was twenty.

I would think that if my mother was from Tunsia, I'd have had lots of questions about that too.

I do understand about hiding one's Jewishness. My own great-grandfather was a hidden Jew in Hungary (where and when it made a lot more sense to hide one's Jewish identity), and while he wasn't particularly forthcoming, the family knew the signs. The suspicions were passed down through the generations and finally confirmed by research.

The other element of this saga that doesn't track is that Allen has presidential aspirations--there is simply no way that a campaign is going to let skeletons sit in the closet unexamined. Its pretty much standard practice to investigate the family history of any major political talent, either for profit or damage control.

Allen has put his tit in a ringer with this one--not by being a Jew, but by pulling a John Kerry.

The most recent polls have Tom Kean Jr. (R) leading Bob Menendez 44 to 38 by likely voters and 44 to 36 among registered voters.

Apparently everyone is thinking the same thing--when will the party pull Menendez aside and tell him he's sick and needs to spend more time with his family?

After the shock of a long-timer like Foley getting nicked for instant messager sex with a congressional page, came the inevitable question--when did the House leadership know about it and why did they "fail to act"?

Well apparently Dennis Hastert did know about it, having discussed the matter with the parents and warning Foley to cut it out, but what the NYT didn't say is that the earlier messages were considerably tamer than the later emails, which in this case made all the difference in the world.

The only clearly guilty party, as far as I can see--aside from Foley--is the New York Times, which hyped the anti-Hastert angle by conflating the earlier, suggestive emails and the later damning ones. Here's the Carl Hulse/Raymond Hernandez Times lede:

Top House Republicans knew for months about e-mail traffic between Representative Mark Foley and a former teenage page, but kept the matter secret and allowed Mr. Foley to remain head of a Congressional caucus on children's issues, Republican lawmakers said Saturday.

All hands on deck at the NYT. There's an election coming up!...

John Hinderaker puts Hastert's inaction into perspective:

Well, maybe. But the starting point is to figure out what Foley did. As far as I can tell from the news stories I've read, there is no claim that Foley did anything with any House page. The claim is that he sent inappropriate emails to one or more pages. These emails were described to Hastert, apparently, as "over friendly," but he was also told that the family of the page in question "didn't want the matter pursued." I've never been Speaker of the House, but I can imagine that such a conversation would not be among the most significant Hastert has had in the last year, and would not necessarily make a deep impression. Foley was, I take it, generally assumed to be gay.

Quite possible--I'll wait to hear what Hastert has to say about the matter.

Hinderaker also taps Barney Franks, although I am not quite sure what relation his particular troubles have to Hastert's inaction with regards to Foley.

Franks went a little too far in bailing out his felon boyfriend and got his hand slapped by Congress as a result, but Franks' career continues to prosper, while Foley resigned so fast it made our heads spin. Now some might point to Foley's hypocrisy as the culprit, but while there is no doubt he's a hypocrite, the real problem for Foley is the expectations of his constituency. Franks was elected in a district where is homosexuality if not exactly an asset, didn't hurt him at all, and the fact the he fixed some tickets probably helped him--after all who doesn't want a Congressman who can get him out of a jam? What's the point of having friends in high places if they can't short circuit the sclerotic bureaucracy for you? Foley's campaign website is downhttp://www.markfoley.com/
, but its a safe bet he was running on traditional Republican values, including family values.

Foley's chamelon strategy for conducting his political career is a lesson for the Republican party--if you run on Republican values--say fiscal responsibility for example, then you had better damn well mean it.

I've consistently been unimpressed with allegedly seasoned political pundits making forecasts based on some pretty flimsy foundations.

Almost anywhere I looked the past few days, its was blythely conceded that Foley's district was a lost cause. I thought this was cracked and said so. Now Mickey Kaus highlights some polls that bear me out.

Not So Fast! Are we sure Rep. Foley's Florida seat is lost to the GOPs? One thing pundits seem to agree on is that "there is no question [the Foley scandal] has cost them at least one House seat," in the words of RCP's John McIntyre. That would be Foley's seat. Only 14 to go for the Dems, it would seem. But Majority Watch has already taken a post-resignation poll in Foley's district --on Sunday, Oct 1. (Click on the middle of the three glowing dots in Florida.) The result is:

Mahoney (D)--50%

Foley (R) -- 43%

True, Sunday was maybe a bit early for the anti-Foley voter reaction to have peaked. On the other hand, the GOPs have a whole month for Republican voters to drift back home, especially when they are told that a vote for "Foley" is in fact a vote for a new GOP candidate, Joe Negron. (And how could they not be paying attention to that question now?) ... Actually, Majority Watch did a second poll,--but this time told voters that "[v]otes for Foley will count as votes for a new Republican nominee to be determined next week"--and the result was

Mahoney (D)--49%

Foley (R)--46%

Seems like a margin that can be made up in a district that, per Majority Watch, is 47-32 Republican, no? ... 6:06 P.M. link

I'm just wondering how flaky the chattering classes think the electorate is? We've been talking about polarization for years now, but suddenly everyone seems to think that you can get people to stop voting for their party or actually switch their votes because a Congressman screwed up. Did Democrats stay home in 2000 because Bill Clinton turned out to be a dog?

If people are motivated enough to go to the polls, its generally because they have some pretty firm ideas about the direction of this country. Republicans in particular are less impressed with a pretty face than with positions that align with their own views

They also know how to use a butterfly ballot.

Terrorism, abortion, taxes--those are issues that move voters. Minor scandals like the Foley affair are something for the media to do for a couple of news cycles.

One doesn't hear too much about Ned Lamont these days. Only a scant five weeks after his squeaker primary victory over Joe Lieberman, Lamont has been trailing between 10-20 points.

Lamont has tipped in 6.3 million of his own considerable cash stash (estimated fortune of 90-300 million) into his campaign, ostensibly because he has refused to take money from PACs and lobbyists. The word is no one is offering any money, so this is likely just cover for a loss of credibility among the Democrat elite. Meanwhile, Lieberman is raking in cash from both Democrats AND Republicans.

Lieberman on Tuesday collected about $400,000 at a fundraiser in Washington, D.C., according to campaign sources.

Sun said today that the event was organized by the Lieberman campaign itself and had no prominent sponsors.

That was not the case last week in Florida, where shopping center developer Mel Sembler, a former finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, organized a Lieberman fundraiser that a top aide to the senator said went like "gangbusters."

Lamont also seems to have fallen from grace among the netroots crowd

Ned Lamont was the blogosphere's first primary victory, but now he's probably going to lose the general election. I seldom see his name on the blogs any more. I see negative things about Lieberman, but never anything positive about Lamont. Why is that?.

...because everyone, including the netroots, knows that Lamont is toast--success has a thousand fathers, and failure is an orphan.

Curt Weldon just got raided by the FBI. So did his daughter (a Washington lobbyists for Russian natural gas interests), so a number of Weldon associates--six raids in total--three weeks before the election.

If Weldon is dirty, then he should be investigated--I'm no Democrat who thinks the justice system is a cudgel to use against your political enemies and excuse your friends. But triggering a massive, public FBI raid on a Congressman three weeks before an election is nothing short of a coup attempt.

Whoever authorized this at the FBI should be tried, convicted and sentenced to an appropriately long prison sentence, and I don't mean 28 months. Why? You are monkeying with the electoral process and disenfranchising voters--few acts are as treasonous.

The whole matter just begs the question--if the Republicans own the House, the Senate and the Presidency, who do the Democrats seem to have total control over law enforcement, the judicial system and every other federal bureacracy?

There simply has to be a purge of the bureaucracy--investigations, firings, prison-time for miscreants. We cannot claim to live in a democracy when apparachniks simply hijack the state for the own purposes.

Remember the handwringing over the butterfly ballot confusion in 2000? The unfairness of it all. Al Gore lost something just north of 6000 votes due to double punches (Bush lost 1600 votes).

It appears that the Democrat notion of fairness is much like a 5-year olds--whatever is good for them is fair, whatever isn't good for them, isn't.

The candidate replacing Florida's disgraced former Rep. Mark Foley on the ballot in next month's election has been barred from posting signs at polling places clarifying that votes for Foley will actually go to him, authorities said on Wednesday.

No Democrats will complain about "the unfairness of it all" if Mahoney actually wins.

In spite of the expected insistence by the far left that Lieberman (MyDD seems to have taken that particular post down...) got creamed in the debates, the most recent poll shows a 17 point lead going into the final days of the election.

I am not particularly credulous about poll numbers, but 17 points is pretty hard to ignore

The debate between Lieberman and Lamont on Monday was their first since the August primary. Among those in the poll who watched the debate or read or heard about it, only 3 percent said it changed their minds. "Ned Lamont needed to score a knockout in the debates to catch Sen. Joseph Lieberman, but he apparently didn't lay a glove on him," poll director Douglas Schwartz said.

The poll suggested that Lieberman's support among Republicans and independent voters was substantial.

Lieberman leads Lamont 70 percent to 9 percent among likely Republican voters, with 18 percent for Schlesinger, and 58-36 among likely independent voters. Likely Democratic voters back Lamont, 55 percent to 36 percent.

How much outrage have you heard about the Florida Democrat party filing a motion to block the posting of signs to inform voters that to vote for Joe Negron, they must vote for disgraced former Congressman Mark Foley.

An reverence for the letter of the law, or a cynical ploy to disenfranchise Florida voters? Well, you know the answer. The Crats won the case, decided by a Democrat judge and we have to rely on the fact that Republicans are smarter than Democrat voters and can handle a little complication like this.

Flash across the country, Google-map-like to Orange county California, where the world has come to an end because a long-shot Republican candidate's campaign wrote a letter to Hispanic constituents reminding them that it is illegal for non-citizens to vote.

State and federal officials were investigating the letter, which was written in Spanish and mailed to an estimated 14,000 Democratic voters in central Orange County. It warns, ''You are advised that if your residence in this country is illegal or you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that could result in jail time.''

A lot is being made of the phrase, "...or you are an immigrant," yet no one in the press made the slightest intimation that Democrats sued to block the signs in Florida so they could steal an election.

I tend to discount the notion that Nguyen was trying to fool Hispanic citizens into staying home--if you're a citizen, you know you can vote. The racist angle is rather silly--accusing a Vietnamese immigrant of being racist and anti-immigrant--gimme a break.

Senate

Connecticut: Ned Lamont
Maryland: Ben Cardin

Maryland: Ben Cardin

Missouri: Claire McCaskill

Missouri: Claire McCaskill

Michigan: Debbie Stabenow

Montana: Jon Tester

Ohio: Sherrod Brown

Pennsylvania: Bob Casey

Tennessee: Harold Ford

Tennessee: Harold Ford

New Jersey: Bob Menendez

Virginia: James Webb

House

(AZ-5): Harry Mitchell
(AZ-08): Gabrielle Giffords
(CO-07): Ed Perlmutter

(CT-04): Diane Farrell

(CT-05): Chris Murphy

(FL-16): Tim Mahoney

(GA-03): Jim Marshall

(GA-12): John Barrow

(IA-01): Bruce Braley

(IL-06): Tammy Duckworth

(IL-17): Phil Hare

(IN-08): Brad Ellsworth

(IN-09): Baron Hill

(NC-13): Brad Miller

(NH-02): Paul Hodes

(NM-01): Patricia Madrid

(NY-20): Kirsten Gillibrand

(NY-24): Michael Arcuri

(NY-29): Eric Massa

(OH-15): Mary Jo Kilroy

(OH-18): Zack Space

(PA-07): Joe Sestak

(PA-10): Chris Carney

(PA-08): Patrick Murphy

(PA-12): John Murtha

(VA-02): Phil Kellam

(WA-8): Darcy Burner

(WI-08): Steve Kagen

During the World Series, the McCaskill campaign aired a commercial featuring a twitching Michael J. Fox (obviously off his meds to accentuate the nature of his illness...)

Setting aside that embryonic stem cell research is a massive scam perpetrated on the American public (and apparently Michael J. Fox), its a good slam on Jim Talent.

When I was in the midwest a couple of weeks ago, I noted several radio commercials for Democrat candidates talking about their support for stem cell research.

Will it make a difference?

I don't think so.

Its a good political issue, but it isn't the dominant political issue--no one who plans to vote Republican is going to change their vote on the basis of support for embryonic stem cell research (which is an admitted loser by comparison with completely legal and well-funded research into adult stem cell and cord cells). Democrats may in fact favor stem cell research, but is that the impetus they need to turn off reruns of "Sex in the City", put the bong away and drive over to the polling station? Not likely. In a mid-term election, particularly against an incumbent, you generally have to have some pretty fundamental issues working for you. Having said that though, I think there is too much focus on issues at the expense of some more salient elements--demographics, money and turnout.

Barron's prediction that the Republicans will win the Senate and House is based on a simple fact--the candidate with more money has historically won 93% of the time, and 98% of the time in the more recent elections--its why new House members spend all of their first term and a good part of the second term raising money to get reelected.

Fundamentally, and in so many ways, this is the main reason Democrats are perennial losers--they simply have no ability to prioritize. They spend their time on media gotchas instead of fund-raising, issues like stem-cell research instead of national security and the economy. Bill Clinton didnt make this mistake--his campaign featured the famously pointed reminder of what the overriding issue was going to be in the 1992 election--"Its the Economy Stupid..."

I'm going to predict that one of the outcomes of this election will be the end of Howard Dean's career in national politics. Hillary Clinton already took him to task back in August for screwing up the fund-raising.

Hillary took a shot at Dean's 50-State Strategy last Friday at a DNC fund-raising event. "The [Republican National Committee] is pouring tens of millions of dollars into races and we're not matching that. We're doing investments, you know, in ground [operations] and other efforts which will be very beneficial, but the RNC has about $60 million to $70 million waiting to drop on our candidates."

Hillary Clinton is one person in the Democrat party who understands the fundamentals of winning elections. Does anyone else in the Crat party?

Don Surber notes a couple of articles bemoaning the stinginess of politicians on both sides of the aisle.

Following up on a MyDD post by Chris Bowers, which begged for Democrats with safe seats to come to the aid of challengers in other districts, Brownstein reported: “Bowers has identified 69 Democratic incumbents without serious opposition whose combined campaign treasuries total roughly $50 million.”

But these rich Democratic incumbents ain’t budging. Money is power and they expect something more than genuflections for the dough they earned the old fashioned way -- by sucking up to fatcats. Hey, junior, you want $50 million, you hit the rubber chicken circuit.

Republicans are no better, which brings me to my point.

I just read a quote of John Cole (Balloon Juice) on Greg Prince's blog that as the usual indignant hippie crap about the "establishment". Let's remind him that those same hippies are the one's with the padlocked wallets, the tax lawyers and the sweetheart deals at the expense of the little people. Making corruption a party issue is incredibly naive, because --face it, politicians are as a class, a sorry bunch of assholes.

There are exceptions, but I doubt they're anyone we know.

Its been a while since I've noted my long-time observation that the political system demands the kinds of politicians it gets.

Consider how the legal profession works. Like everywhere else in the country, some of the finest commercial realestate in the region consists of buildings owned by law firms. Where do law firms get those kinds of bucks? By suing people for lots of money. The more money you have, the more likely it is that you'll be sued. Years ago I was involved in a small business that was eventually sold. Not surprisingly, the law suits started appearing out of nowhere the minute we were part of a larger corporate entity. What happened? From one day to the next, nothing fundamentally changed in the business except the ownership. The new owner was "deep pockets" and some lawyer somewhere saw a downpayment on an office building.

Its an incredibly cynical business, and the culture is tailormade to spill over into the political arena where the real money is.

Is it a coincidence that so many politicians are lawyers? I wrote at length about Harry Reid's extensive land-swap involvement on behalf on what can only be describes as "clients". Reid was doing in politics what he had done in law practice, but now he had the ultimate cash cow--the federal bureaucracy. He of course didn't "sue" the federal bureaucracy, but he did find ways to extract significant concessions on behalf of his clients, making them, and of course himself, very rich (you can build a nice place for 1.2 million...)

What you are doing when you vote for a certain politicians is essentially hiring a lawyer to represent your interests, either to screw some other hapless constituency, or to defend you from politicians trying to screw you.

'K' street has been getting a lot of flack lately, but frankly, they are the noblest enterprise in Washington--truly representing their constituencies with a single-mindedness and purity. That some express shock that they buy the favors of politicians is absurb--absolutely everyone is for sale on both sides of the aisle and its just a question of whom we will buy and for how much.

--AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl
--AZ-01: Rick Renzi
--AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth
--CA-04: John Doolittle
--CA-11: Richard Pombo
--CA-50: Brian Bilbray
--CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave
--CO-05: Doug Lamborn
--CO-07:Rick O'Donnell
--CT-04: Christopher Shays
--FL-13: Vernon Buchanan
--FL-16: Joe Negron
--FL-22: Clay Shaw
--ID-01: Bill Sali
--IL-06: Peter Roskam
--IL-10: Mark Kirk
--IL-14: Dennis Hastert
--IN-02: Chris Chocola
--IN-08: John Hostettler
--IA-01: Mike Whalen
--KS-02: Jim Ryun
--KY-03: Anne Northup
--KY-04: Geoff Davis
--MD-Sen: Michael Steele
--MN-01: Gil Gutknecht
--MN-06: Michele Bachmann
--MO-Sen: Jim Talent
--MT-Sen: Conrad Burns
--NV-03: Jon Porter
--NH-02: Charlie Bass
--NJ-07: Mike Ferguson
--NM-01: Heather Wilson
--NY-03: Peter King
--NY-20: John Sweeney
--NY-26: Tom Reynolds
--NY-29: Randy Kuhl
--NC-08: Robin Hayes
--NC-11: Charles Taylor
--OH-01: Steve Chabot
--OH-02: Jean Schmidt
--OH-15: Deborah Pryce
--OH-18: Joy Padgett
--PA-04: Melissa Hart
--PA-07: Curt Weldon
--PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick
--PA-10: Don Sherwood
--RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee
--TN-Sen: Bob Corker
--VA-Sen: George Allen
--VA-10: Frank Wolf
--WA-Sen: Mike McGavick
--WA-08: Dave Reichert

I was listening to a bit of NPR and not surprisingly perhaps, heard that Tennesseans are shocked at an ad that seems to infer that Harold Ford likes to party with white women.

To be perfectly honest, when the Democrats were cycling Harold Ford Jr. through one of their routine infatuations with this or that black politician as a possible presidential candidate, it simply didn't register with me that Ford was black.

It seems there was plenty of partying with white men and women among Harold's ancestors--not that unusual really considering the liberties taken with slaves, but even without slavery, mixed race is the rule rather than the exception. In the U.S., 50% of all Hispanics are either Mulatto or Mestizo (native American heritage). We stopped counting Mulattos in the U.S. Census early in the 20th century, but its safe to say that a majority of African Americans have European ancestry as well.

I think its smart for the Ford campaign to take issue with the whole black man-white woman thing, but the ad was clearly going for the much more politically explosive aspect of Ford's single status--his promiscuity.

Ford is in a bad spot being a batchelor, because the default assumption is that he is gay, so partying with bunnies could be considered a good thing in some respects since horn-dog goes over better in the mid-west than gay, particularly in light of Mark Foley's page predilection. For a guy who has been groomed for politics since childhood, its a curiosity that Ford didn't get married at some point. Even a real gay fellow like Jim McGreevey could see that married-with-kids was a political asset, so much so that he did it twice.

Good luck getting Ford to talk about it

The irony is that Ford probably isn't black enough for a really br